November 5, 2013
Posted by Richard SocaridesOn Monday, (click here) the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), a bill which would prohibit discrimination in employment based upon sexual orientation or gender identity, successfully passed its last procedural hurdle on route to final consideration in the Senate. Its passage, later this week, is now all but certain. Seven Republicans have joined fifty-four Democrats in supporting the bill. But, hours before the Senate vote, House Speaker John Boehner signalled that Republicans in the House would block it....
With Democrats throughout the House and Senate, President Obama signed The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009 (click here). It is hard to believe this legislation was necessary in the USA, but, it is even more starkly alarming it took the first African American President to see it through to law. It says something about the deep seated hate in the USA regarding minorities.
There are two specific reasons I see ENDA falling short of expectations. If ENDA is passed into law it will receive challenges to the Supreme Court as a contradiction to EEOC and the Right to Work Laws.
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) (click here)
This law makes it illegal to discriminate against someone on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, or sex. The law also makes it illegal to retaliate against a person because the person complained about discrimination, filed a charge of discrimination, or participated in an employment discrimination investigation or lawsuit. The law also requires that employers reasonably accommodate applicants' and employees' sincerely held religious practices, unless doing so would impose an undue hardship on the operation of the employer's business....
This is going to be hard to write as well as hard to read by some, but, I do believe this is the course of the legislation.
This is The Equal Rights Amendment (click here) in it's entirety.
Section 1. Equality of Rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of sex.
Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.
The Equal Rights Amendment was written in 1921 by suffragist Alice Paul. It has been introduced in Congress every session since 1923. It passed Congress in the above form in 1972, but was not ratified by the necessary thirty-eight states by the July 1982 deadline. It was ratified by thirty-five states.
No different than the repeated Amendments to the USA Constitution to bring African Americans their rightful place and equity in this society, the Amendments have always fallen short of their promises. It is the politics of hate that have kept the minority and/or women's population disadvantaged to their potential.
Women and minorities are still second class citizens in the USA. The word sex is interesting as manipulated in the legislation of the USA. It is a word the Right Wing hangs on to in order to defeat equality. The EEOC has always been a target of the Right Wing, so let's finish this.
When Speaker Boner states he believes there is already legislation that states all the obvious need for ENDA he is referring to the word sex in the laws of the EEOC. When average Americans think about the word 'sex' it is usually in reference to gender as in boy and girl, "What is the sex of the child?" or the act of making love, "We had some of the best sex in our lives."
But, when the Right Wing thinks of the word sex is takes on a different character. I am pleased Boner actually showed 'the truth' of his political biases and that of his party.
The word sex when 'interpreted' by the Right Wing is a code word for homosexual. One of the reasons the EEOC is disdained by the Right Wing is because it is believed the law can actually uphold the rights of the LGBT community. It was a known bias used against the ERA. The fear mongering that existed when the ERA was making the rounds as an amendment to be passed by two-thirds of the states is that the word sex would allow 'the homosexual' the rights of 'normal people' and there would be no protection from them teaching in the public schools.
There are people in the country that have a great deal of success by hating 'the career woman' and 'the homosexual' and 'the black. ' It works. It is a very successful strategy to drive those fearful of these 'ghosts of the American soul' to the ballot box.
There is nothing that is going to stop the south from 'dealing with people' on it's own terms. There are those hate groups and individuals that believe the USA is a White/Caucasian Christian Male Dominated culture and that should never change. Therefore, when a Gay Man was to invoke his rights under ENDA it wouldn't work, because, in the south an employer regardless of the size of the company, if they don't like you for any reason you lose your job. It is a paradigm that maintains 'social order' in the south and oppresses the average person, be they man or woman, white or black, gay or straight.
The USA's economy is based in capitalism. The Right Wing would like it to be pure capitalism that even runs any government structure while collecting legislated taxes to pay the private sector to perform the functions of government. In the south, the economy is that of the impoverished dependent on federal monies. That has been the case for a long time. The only rights more southerns have are federal laws, therefore, the stronger the federal legislation to provide human rights, yet alone citizen rights is a threat to the social order and would result in the fall of the financial political base of the Right Wing.
ENDA was backed by the Late Senator Kennedy, a white guy from Massachusetts with a big heart that had no desire to understand any of the hate of those inclined to invoke it. The legislation is exceptionally noble, as was his style. But, to believe ENDA would perform to it's written potential in states where hate means political success is unrealistic. It would fail the LGBT community in the same way as all the constitutional amendments have failed the African American community and suffrage has failed women. The vote for African Americans and women have not carried out it's promise of sincere equity.
You don't have to take my word for it. Here it is again. Fear mongering for the purpose of political success in Texas.
November 7, 2013
The Lone Star State(click here) is suing the Obama administration in Lubbock, Texas, federal court over what is considered a law that compromises public safety and workplace security, according to a statement on Thursday by a public-interest law group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption and out-and-out criminal allegations...
So, Texas not only uses illegal substances to kill their death row inmates, enjoys the status as the state with the most death row inmates dead; now is seeking to oppress those that have served their sentences and are seeking to make themselves whole to regain a life that will see them to economic viability.
The reason the US House believes ENDA is not necessary is because it is just sex after all. No different than man and women are opposite sexes, the homosexual is it's own sex, right?
